MS-13 members lured victims to remote mountain locations north of Los Angeles and killed them in brutal initiation rituals meant to test loyalty and earn status within the gang, prosecutors told a federal jury this week.

Between 2017 and 2019, the gang members murdered four people in the wilderness outside LA, Deputy District Attorney Eric Siddall said Tuesday in federal court, according to the Los Angeles Times. Five alleged MS-13 members on trial are also accused of two additional killings in Van Nuys and North Hollywood.

“The more ruthless the killing, the greater the respect that was earned,” Siddall told the jury.

MS-13, which was founded four decades ago in Los Angeles by Salvadoran immigrants, has since expanded into a transnational criminal organization controlled in part by leaders imprisoned in Central America.

Prosecutors allege that beginning around 2016, an influx of gang members from El Salvador brought “the Salvadoran rules,” requiring new recruits to commit murder to prove their loyalty.

open image in gallery

The goal, Siddall said, was to be recognized as a “homeboy,” or full-fledged member.

Defense attorneys argued that the prosecution’s case relied on testimony from eight cooperating witnesses who admitted to multiple murders in exchange for lighter sentences.

One compared the defendants to “child soldiers” raised amid extreme violence. Another said his client “did what he had to do” to survive. “If you fail to follow an order to participate in a killing,” the lawyer added, “you’re next.”

Meanwhile, prosecutors described the defendants as “subpar racketeers but prolific killers” who extorted small-time street vendors and focused mainly on finding enemies or traitors to execute.

Elvin “Winnie Pooh” Hernandez, 20, was killed after gang leaders accused him of falsely claiming MS-13 membership. Near a secluded helipad in the Angeles National Forest, 11 people took turns stabbing him. “The Grim Reaper just took you away,” a gang leader allegedly told him.

In another case, 16-year-old Brayan Andino, a Panorama High School student from Honduras, was lured to Lopez Canyon above Sylmar under the pretense of smoking marijuana. He was ambushed and killed by six MS-13 members using a garrote, baseball bat and a serrated knife called “the gut ripper.”

The same leader, Roberto Corado Ortiz, killed again in 2018, shooting 19-year-old Roger Chavez in the mountains above Malibu after Chavez posted a Snapchat video flashing a rival gang’s hand sign, prosecutors said.

However, not all of the killings took place in remote areas.

In December 2018, 22-year-old Osvaldo Hernandez was shot to death near his family’s Van Nuys apartment after MS-13 members spotted him in an alley marked with rival graffiti. The same group went on to kill two more people, including a homeless man they wrongly believed belonged to a rival gang, prosecutors said.

“His major sin was he was sleeping in their park,” Siddall said. “Their park. As if they own it.”

If convicted, the defendants face life in prison. The jury began deliberating Wednesday.